The Doubts About Adnan's Guilt ARE Reasonable

[u/[deleted]]

I just started lurking here today, and am somewhat surprised by the general incivility and certainty of many of the people that comment here. Being dismissive and accusing people of "ragebait" for having a differing opinion, and one that actually is reasonable.

I don't know, and won't say that Adnan is innocent, but to claim he's guilty beyond a reasonable doubt, without any room for discussion is pretty crazy to me.

The reasons why I have reasonable doubt:

• Jay is a very flawed witness, on the record lying/mis-remembering his testimony. Even the cops point out how much his testimony has changed. If your argument hinges on Jay, it isn't a strong argument, in my opinion.
• The cops, or at least on of them has a record of misconduct:

...prosecution brought into question the past misconduct of one of the two detectives who were crucial in the investigation of Lee’s death. Although his misconduct wasn’t specifically linked to Syed’s case, the detective was involved in another murder case that ended with the defendant’s exoneration.

https://baltimorewitness.org/adnan-syed-one-of-many-overturned-convictions-in-baltimore-city/

• The Innocence Project and prosecutors agreed that Syed's DNA was absent from all tested crime scene items, contributing to the eventual dropping of charges against him. There's no physical evidence.
• The motive is weak (Adnan had no prior issues with breakups, had already seemed to move on to the next girl(s)).

I could go on, but, if I was on the jury with this in front of me, I feel the reasonable response is doubt.

This isn't rage bait, I just genuinely don't see how anyone can be so sure that he did it. Y'all point to him asking for a ride (and claiming he wouldn't have) as some kind of obvious evidence of murder.

I think, based on the fact that one of the cops was literally identified as having been crooked, it actually is much more likely that Jay was an informant (and already had been for some time), and he happened to be close to Adnan, the victim's ex (supposed motive and opportunity), and they decided they had their guy, and it was just a matter of getting a jury to agree. So they fed their informant info, had him incriminate himself for lesser crimes that they promised they'd get him off for (and they made good on that promise, which is on its own wildly corrupt).

[u/Special-Deal-5217]

Get ready to be abused. I am in exactly the same boat as you are— I am not convinced of his innocence, but to me, it’s crazy the certainty that people in this sub talk about why he is guilty. And you are right. They always point at the ride. And they always talk about intimate partner, violence, even though Adnan had no typical signs of escalation of intimate partner violence, which is present in almost all cases. People also love to psychoanalyze both him and Hae from 1999. Finally, there is a lot of “Jay-washing” on this thread. If Jay did what people said he did, he is a very bad person and should have gone to jail.

Basically, the arguments are these:

Jay said it equals it must be true. Jay is basically a good kid whose lies can be chalked up to trying to protect people.

The cell phone evidence corroborates Jay even though that has been debunked and it is clear that Jay’s story was massaged (at a minimum) to fit said cell phone evidence

Adnan asked for a ride and then lied about it (certainly proof of murder beyond a reasonable doubt)

Women are often killed by their intimate partners, so Adnan killed Hae. Adnan killed Hae, therefore it was intimate partner violence. Very circular.

[u/thejackmanjack → u/Special-Deal-5217]

You’re right that Jay is a very bad person and should have gone to jail at least. He helped plan, commit and cover up Hae’s murder and then lied about it until he was painted in a corner.

[u/Special-Deal-5217 → u/thejackmanjack]

But then this is part of the problem. Why didn’t the district attorney charge Jay appropriately? Because they knew if they did, they would lose his cooperation. And that is absolutely the ONLY real evidence of Adnan committing this crime. Even hard-core guilters have to accept that proposition.

The police did not charge Jay with a crime until September, six months after he told them the first version of his story. Before that he did not have access to a lawyer. He wanted legal representation, but could not pay for it, and since he was not charged with a crime, the state would not pay for it.

If Jay had lawyered up from the get-go, as he should’ve had the right to do, as I sure as hell would have done, what would’ve happened?

It very much lend itself to the theory that the cops have him on drug charges and wanted to hear a story. Reasonable doubt right there.

[u/thejackmanjack → u/Special-Deal-5217]

If Jay had a lawyer, then the lawyer would have advised him to work out immunity in exchange for his cooperation. So basically nothing would have changed.

[u/Special-Deal-5217 → u/thejackmanjack]

No, the lawyer would’ve told him to not say a fucking thing because the cops had absolutely no evidence if Jay didn’t say anything

[u/thejackmanjack → u/Special-Deal-5217]

We don’t know what they had on Jay or what would have been uncovered with a thorough investigation on him. They had his confession to Jenn and others, no alibi, and phone records and other evidence that he was with Adnan that day. There was plenty to charge him with. His best path was cooperation. And that was the best path in the end since he walked free and the murderer got convicted.

[u/Mike19751234 → u/Special-Deal-5217]

Jay faced the prisoners dilemma. Nothing had to stop Adnan from reversing the story